Chapter Forty-Two

Chapter Forty-Two

Fish Face

“The waters increased and bore up the ark, and it rose high above the earth. And the waters prevailed so mightily on the earth that all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered. The waters prevailed above the mountains, covering them fifteen cubits deep.” Genesis 7:17b, 19 -20

            Shem shook the fin of a smoked salmon between his thumb and forefinger. “You might want to stay by the door so one of these guys doesn’t smack you in the face.” Row after row of the large fish hung from racks rising all the way to the ceiling in this room.

A bemused smile lit Atarah’s face. “You expect a dead fish to wriggle over and slap me in the fa . . . Oof.” She pushed a salmon away from her nose with two fingers. “Yuck. Okay. Okay. I’m backing up. Standing by the door.”

            “I tried to warn you.” Shem laughed as he walked over to her with two fish laying across his forearms arms.

            “That thing swung over and whapped me,” she complained. She wiped oil off her nose before accepting the large smoked salmon then dropped one of them as she fumbled the other onto a wheeled flatbed just outside the door. “Heavy.” She retrieved the fish from the floor and tossed it onto the cart. “I find the sheer quantity of fish in here astounding.”

            “This is nothing.” He grunted as he unhooked another fish. “There’s room after room chock full of them.”

            “What’d you do, stick a sign outside the ark announcing, ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’ and they all swam on?” 

            “So that’s what you think? We snapped our fingers and all the food here just magically appeared?” He rolled his eyes, feigning dismay. “I’ll have you know Ham and I caught every fish in this room from a river near here. Plus we personally stored buffalo and camel and hundreds of other kinds of meat. Some suitable for human consumption. Some appropriate only for enormous carnivorous beasts.”

            “Most of the carnivorous beasts I’ve seen here are still young.” Atarah paused to make her point. “That means they’re small.”

            “Okay. You made your point. I might have exaggerated a little with the ‘enormous’”.

            “You just exaggerated again with the ‘a little’.”

            He bunched his lips to hold back a smile, but his eyes danced.

            “Did you know,” she asked, studying one of the fish, “that our city has an idol like this? A fish carved from wood, covered with hammered gold. And people bake cakes to the god and do evil things in his honor!”

            “Hard to understand,” Shem agreed. He felt love for this woman surge through him anew. She’d come to understand the illogic of idol worship even though she’d been raised with false gods. God had protected her spirit and saved her for him.

“No matter how hard I try, I can’t figure out why people do evil when they worship. I mean, stupidity is one thing, but most gods demand outright evil, and that’s a whole different thing.”

            Atarah’s statement that she didn’t know who Satan was stunned Shem. That should be elementary knowledge for everyone. “You’ve never heard about Satan?” For some reason Shem hadn’t even considered the possibility that no one had explained the source of evil to her. He kept forgetting that his upbringing had been entirely different from hers.

Piling a one last fish onto the cart, he put his back into pulling the load toward one of the lifts and Atarah fell into step alongside the cart. “So who’s Satan?”

            Where should he start? “He was the evil spirit in the Garden of Eden who possessed the serpent and spoke through him to seduce Eve. He’s still the being behind everything bad and violent and wicked in the entire universe. Every evil thought or action on earth results from people surrendering to him.”

            A fish tumbled from the cart and Atarah stooped to retrieve it. “I thought that was a myth.”

“No, the story is true.” Shem covered his surprise at her lack of knowledge.  “Adam and Eve were actual people who walked and talked with the One True God in the Garden. Both were innocent and good until Eve changed everything by becoming the first human to cooperate with evil.”

            “By taking a bite of the fruit?”

“Yes. When she disobeyed God by tasting the fruit she handed kingship of this world over to Satan.”

“Where do idols fit in?”

“All the idols and every one of your city’s thousand are nothing more than fronts for Satan. All paths lead to him.”

“What about the Nephilim?”

“Fallen angels who fought with Satan in a battle against the One True God.”

            Shem pulled the cart onto the food elevator and Atarah stood back apprehensively, obviously afraid of heights. Shem understood how she’d feel that way after her awful day hugging the side of a cliff on her way to the underground.

            “The lift is pretty full. Do you mind taking a ramp? I’ll meet you there.” He grabbed a rope to lower the elevator, calling after her. “Changed my mind, better take the stairs. The ramps will be jammed with animals.” All creatures but humans seemed to avoid stairs. Well, all but the pair of lions he’d seen when he was with Paseah. Plus, he’d spotted a couple raccoons lumbering down another stairway.

            She walked backwards long enough to smile and wave. 

             Atarah located the first stairway and descended in a daze. The news about an actual evil being controlling every vicious violent thought and act on earth stunned her and made her desire to talk to Mother stronger and more urgent. She would leave tonight.

Mother had fought the evil just as Atarah had. If only Mother could understand that the invisible evil around her was a being, an entity who had enslaved her, she’d run from him and onto the ark. Atarah only had to clarify the facts for her.

But first Atarah herself needed to understand more. Question after question peppered her brain as she hurried toward Shem. When she reached the small alcove near a white-washed door where Shem was parking the cart, she immediately asked, “Who is Satan?”

“He was a powerful angel – a guardian cherub. The One True God created him ‘blameless and perfect with every precious stone adorning him and music in his wings.’ That’s a quote from Father.”

“What did he mean – ‘music in his wings?’”

 “Well, . . .” Shem adopted a thoughtful pose, a fish dangling from each hand. “Music comes from our mouths and throats when we sing, so maybe the music in his wings was something like the music that comes from our bodies.”

“You don’t know?”

“I’m speculating,” Shem admitted sheepishly. “I only know for sure that Satan went astray because he grew proud over his own splendor.” He opened a door. “Hang on for a second.” He disappeared inside carrying the fish and she could hear seals barking. A walrus whoofed.

They’d transferred all animals to separate rooms earlier because Noah wanted the animals secure when rising water began violently rocking the ark. Even the crocodiles had their own space. Atarah didn’t understand the need to confine the animals so far ahead of time, but she trusted that Noah and Shem knew the proper procedures and she willingly followed instructions.

As soon as Shem returned, Atarah picked up the thread of conversation. “How did Satan ‘go astray?’”

“He tried to dethrone the One True God and take his place. A third of all the angels in heaven fought with him in a cosmic battle against God.” He continued lugging fish from door to door and tossing them into rooms.

 Heavy sadness settled over her. “God’s own angels fought him? Betrayed the Creator who loved them? They hated him that much?” she whispered huskily. “It must have broken his heart.”

“His heart is broken now, too.” Shem stared pensively into space. “All the violence and wickedness.”

She would tell Mother all this. She had to make Mother see the truth about the One True God. Holding a fish in the crook of her arm, she placed a palm on the white-washed door and started to push.

“Yaaaaaaaaaaah!” Shem yelled. “Don’t open that door!”

“What?”

“If you open that door, you’ll have to eat your words about no enormous dangerous animals on the ark.”

“What?” Her mind was a blank.

“That’s the room I told you about with the snakes that made Ham scream. They’re big enough to swallow you alive.” Shem leveled an I’ve-been-proven-right look at her. “Please note, they’re full grown.”

She yanked her hand back as if it had been resting on a hot surface. A herd of full-grown moose near enough to touch pounded past in the wooden corridor. The up-close snorting and strong smell of the animals startled her. She pressed a hand against her chest and counted. “One, two, three, four . . . seven adults.”

“Yes, adults.” Shem grinned triumphantly.  

“No. I meant why seven?” She couldn’t tell if the snakes or the moose were making her heart beat.

“Seven of each clean animal, remember?” He grinned. “Theses guys meet the criteria since they have hooves and chew the cud.”

 “At least they’re not carnivorous.” She regained her composure and chucked the last fish into a room.

“They won’t eat you, but their hooves can leave a nasty bruise.” Seven turkeys gobbled by in a loose clump. “Not to worry.” Shem straightened to his full height and squared his shoulders. “Your great protector is here.”

“Not to worry.” Atarah laughed. “I plan to eat them. Are we done with the feeding?”

            “We are.” He smiled down at her and grabbed the cart handle. “Time for dinner.”

            “Shouldn’t we haul a couple loads of water first? Those moose looked thirsty.”

            “We’re done hauling water. The Flood’s so close we have enough.”

Her mind spun and emptied. “What?”

“We have enough water. The ark launches in less than three days.”

            “What!?” Atarah’s legs threatened to buckle under her. She felt as if her bones had dissolved and her body was collapsing in on itself. “No!” She started first left, then right, then left again. Which way should she go? She couldn’t think. Mother!

What had come over Atarah? An iron clamp gripped Shem’s heart as he watched her stagger, ashen-faced, in a circle, her eyes dark stagnant pools. “Atarah.” He touched her arm to calm her. She shook him off causing his emotions to jolt and tumble. “You knew about the Flood.”

Didn’t she? Yes. They’d talked about it. He remembered talking with her about the Flood, but had he told her how soon?

            Unseeing eyes shifted to his.

            Shem’s feelings about the Flood before he met Atarah flashed into his mind. Though he had understood the inevitability of God’s punishment, he hadn’t been ready for the Flood. Not until he met Atarah. And even now he experienced occasional feelings of fear. Who knew if they would survive?

“You’re not ready for the Flood yet?”

            She blinked. “My mother.”

            At the sound of her voice, relief buoyed his emotions.

“I can’t let my mother die in the Flood.”

His understanding of her intent skipped ahead of her words and his heart plummeted to his stomach. “You know it’s impossible to find her and bring her here in three days.”

Her back stiffened and determination sparked from her eyes. “I can if I go through the underground.”

“No, you can’t!” Her illogic infuriated him. She knew the journey would take weeks. “You don’t know the way.”

“I know one of the tunnels down there leads to the city.”

 “You may not be able to find it again. If you do, you could still be accosted by Peleg or Dagaar or . . .” Anger coagulated the names in his throat, preventing him from listing all the threats to her safety. “You don’t even know if your mother would want to come onto the ark.”

“She will when I explain everything.”

“You don’t know that. She’s had years.”

“She didn’t want to leave Father. Or the rest of us. But things are different now.”

“Why?” He saw hesitancy flicker in her eyes. “I don’t want you to go. I don’t want you to die!” The instant he heard the pathos in his own voice, Shem’s anger evaporated. What did Father say about anger? The emotion covers fear. Shem suddenly understood that his anger sprang from fear for Atarah’s safety and fear of losing her. He felt his eyes soften into a plea. “I love you!”

Unfortunately, his declaration came out as more desperate than romantic. He chided himself.

Liquid sapphire shimmered in Atarah’s eyes before she dropped her head. Tears fell to the plank floor where they grew into dark circles. “Mother thinks I hate her.”

What could he say? Atarah’s mother deserved her daughter’s disdain, so she couldn’t know Atarah had forgiven her. Silently, he put his arms around Atarah and pulled her close. With her head on his chest, he held her as she sobbed.

She would have to choose: God, Shem, and hard work on the ark followed by a new life in a new world -- or reconciliation with her mother. And death. Seemed like an obvious choice to Shem, but maybe not to Atarah. Guilt did strange things to people and she felt guilty about her mother.

When her crying finally quieted, Shem said very simply, “I want you to be my wife.” He wished he could be more dramatic. More persuasive. He wanted to proclaim his deep need for her. Tell her how he had longed for her his entire life. Dreamed about her. Made his room beautiful for her. He wanted to beg her to choose him. To love him.

He didn’t. Instead, he patiently waited while her face stayed buried in his chest.

He knew she had to make the choice of her own free will. He loved her too much to take that from her. Suddenly he understood for the first time why God had given humans free will. He didn’t want puppets who followed him reluctantly. God wanted love and respect. Relationship.

Those were the same things Shem wanted from Atarah, but only if she chose to give them. He couldn’t – wouldn’t – manipulate her into being what he wanted. The world may have fallen into chaos and violence because of free will, but Shem nevertheless understood the wisdom in God’s decision. Shem was grateful to be one of the few people on earth who had chosen God above everything else. He hoped Atarah would choose God, too. And choose Shem.

Finally, Atarah released a shivering sigh. He cupped her chin in his hand and lifted her face. Her eyes shone with grief.

“I do love you,” she said. “I’ve loved you since the first moment I saw you on the ark. I want to spend my life with you. I want to learn more about the One True God so I can serve him. I want to stay on the ark and live. I want to get to know your family better. I want to bear your children.” She paused and her eyes shifted back and forth over his face as though searching for something. “But I don’t know if I can live knowing my mother died without me at least trying to save her.” 

For a brief moment, Shem considered tearing into the city on an elephant with Atarah to bring back her mother, but he knew he couldn’t. God had called him to the ark. Father needed his help to finish God’s work. Abandoning his mission would mean rejecting God, and Shem refused to do that.

“I love you.” Shem squared his shoulders and chose God over Atarah. “And I’ll never forget you. But if you decide to leave the ark, you’ll go without me.”